Psalm lxxxvii. 4. אוכיר רהבII. RAHAB. The Psalmist speaks of another Rahab, different from this now mentioned. I will make mention of Rahab, and Babylon, to them that know me. And again, Psalm lxxxix. 10. Thou hast broken Rahab in pieces, or the Egyptian. Isaiah li. 9. and xxx. 7. makes use of the same Word Rahab to mark out the Destruction of Pharaoh and his Army in the Red Sea. See also Job xxvi. 12. By his Understanding he smiteth through the Proud; the Hebrew says, Rahab. The most skilful Commentators1 explain this of Egypt, and particularly of that Part of Lower Egypt which is called Delta, because of its Likeness to the Letter Δ, making a Kind of Triangle, whose Base is the Mediterranean Sea. This Part of Egypt is still called Rib or Rif, the Pear, because of its Similitude to the Shape of this Fruit. M. d’Herbelot says, in his Bibliotheca Orientalis, that the Name Rif, is given to that Part of Egypt, which begins at Cairo, and stretches out towards the North: And that the Arabians call by the Name of Giouf, that Part of the same Country which the Greeks call Delta, and which contains all the Country enclosed by the Nile, till it empties itself into the Mediterranean Sea.
St. Jerom and the antient Greek Interpreters have often translated Rahab by Pride, or the Proud. But the Fathers, and such Interpreters2 who have not consulted the Original, have understood by Rahab, no other than the Woman of Jericho, of whom we have spoke in the foregoing Article.
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